- Ecuador vice president says Noboa seeking her 'banishment'
- Leicester boss Van Nistelrooy aware of 'bigger picture' as Liverpool await
- Syria authorities say armed groups have agreed to disband
- Maresca expects Man City to be in title hunt as he downplays Chelsea's chancs
- South Africa opt for all-pace attack against Pakistan
- Guardiola adamant Man City slump not all about Haaland
- Global stocks mostly higher in thin pre-Christmas trade
- Bethlehem marks sombre Christmas under shadow of war
- 11 killed in blast at Turkey explosives plant
- Indonesia considers parole for ex-terror chiefs: official
- Postecoglou says Spurs 'need to reinforce' in transfer window
- Le Pen says days of new French govt numbered
- Villa boss Emery set for 'very difficult' clash with Newcastle
- Investors swoop in to save German flying taxi startup
- How Finnish youth learn to spot disinformation
- 12 killed in blast at Turkey explosives plant
- Panama leaders past and present reject Trump's threat of Canal takeover
- Hong Kong police issue fresh bounties for activists overseas
- Saving the mysterious African manatee at Cameroon hotspot
- India consider second spinner for Boxing Day Test
- London wall illuminates Covid's enduring pain at Christmas
- Poyet appointed manager at South Korea's Jeonbuk
- South Korea's opposition vows to impeach acting president
- The tsunami detection buoys safeguarding lives in Thailand
- Teen Konstas to open for Australia in Boxing Day India Test
- Asian stocks mostly up after US tech rally
- US panel could not reach consensus on US-Japan steel deal: Nippon
- The real-life violence that inspired South Korea's 'Squid Game'
- Blogs to Bluesky: social media shifts responses after 2004 tsunami
- Tennis power couple de Minaur and Boulter get engaged
- Supermaxi yachts eye record in gruelling Sydney-Hobart race
- Hawaii's Kilauea volcano erupts, spewing columns of lava
- El Salvador Congress votes to end ban on metal mining
- Five things to know about Panama Canal, in Trump's sights
- NBA fines Minnesota guard Edwards $75,000 for outburst
- Haitians massacred for practicing voodoo were abducted, hacked to death: UN
- Inter beat Como to keep in touch with leaders Atalanta
- Man Utd boss Amorim questions 'choices' of Rashford's entourage
- Trump's TikTok love raises stakes in battle over app's fate
- Is he serious? Trump stirs unease with Panama, Greenland ploys
- England captain Stokes to miss three months with torn hamstring
- Support grows for Blake Lively over smear campaign claim
- Canada records 50,000 opioid overdose deaths since 2016
- Jordanian, Qatari envoys hold talks with Syria's new leader
- France's second woman premier makes surprise frontline return
- France's Macron announces fourth government of the year
- Netanyahu tells Israel parliament 'some progress' on Gaza hostage deal
- Guatemalan authorities recover minors taken by sect members
- Germany's far-right AfD holds march after Christmas market attack
- Serie A basement club Monza fire coach Nesta
G20 wrestles with wars, climate in run-up to Trump
Chinese President Xi Jinping warned Monday the world faces "a new period of major changes" as G20 leaders met in Brazil two months before Donald Trump returns to the White House.
US President Joe Biden was attending his last summit of the world's leading economies, but as a lame duck eclipsed by Xi who has cast himself as a protector of the international order in the Trump 2.0 era.
World leaders are meeting for two days to try to jumpstart stalled UN climate talks and overcome their differences on wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, and extracting more tax from the super-rich.
In a nod to the return of China hawk Trump, Xi told British Prime Minister Keir Starmer the world was "entering a new period of major changes."
As leaders lined up to meet the most powerful man in Rio, Xi added that Britain and China would "shoulder the important task of... responding to global challenges."
- Feeding the hungry -
Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was using his hosting duties to promote left-wing issues close to his heart, including fighting hunger and climate change.
At the opening of the summit he launched the centerpiece of his G20 presidency: a Global Alliance against Poverty and Hunger, backed by 81 countries, which aims to feed half a million people by 2030.
Before the summit, the 79-year-old host, who is attempting to chart a non-aligned course in international affairs, said he would try steer discussions away from the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
"Because if not, we will not discuss other things which are more important for people that are not at war," he said.
But Biden's decision on the eve of the summit to allow Ukraine to use long-range US missiles to strike inside Russia threatens to escalate a war Trump has vowed to quickly end.
Biden sought to rally support for Kyiv, urging G20 leaders to support Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity.
He also called on them to "increase pressure" on Hamas for a ceasefire in Israel's war with the Gaza militants.
A Brazilian foreign ministry source told AFP that some countries wanted to renegotiate the wording of a draft final statement for the summit.
"For Brazil and other countries the text is already finalized, but some countries want to open up some points on wars and climate," the source told AFP.
- Pressure for a climate deal -
G20 leaders are under pressure to try rescue UN climate talks in Azerbaijan, which have stalled on the issue of greater climate finance for developing countries.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called on the world's biggest economies, who account for 80 percent of global emissions, to show "leadership" on the issue in Rio.
The UN is seeking $1 trillion a year for developing countries to cope with global warming.
But rich countries are stalling, say they want fast-developing economies like China and the Gulf states to also put their hands in their pockets.
The meeting comes in a year marked by another grim litany of extreme weather events, including Brazil's worst wildfire season in over a decade, fuelled by a record drought blamed at least partly on climate change.
The get-together caps a farewell diplomatic tour by Biden which took him to Lima for a meeting of Asia-Pacific trading partners, and then to the Amazon in the first such visit for a sitting US president.
Biden, who has looked to burnish his legacy as time runs down on his presidency, insisted in the Amazon that his record on cutting emissions would survive another Trump White House.
Conspicuously absent from the summit is Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose arrest is sought by the International Criminal Court over the Ukraine war.
- Taxing billionaires -
Brazil is leading a push for higher taxes on billionaires.
But Lula has reportedly faced resistance from Argentine President Javier Milei, who brags that Trump is inspired by his low-tax, cost-cutting agenda.
Argentina's lead negotiator on the summit text, Federico Pinedo, told AFP that Buenos Aires has raised some objections and would not "necessarily" sign the text. He did not elaborate.
But a Brazilian foreign ministry source on Monday downplayed the likelihood of Argentina blocking a consensus.
P.Sousa--PC